Reference Notification Method and Apparatus

ABSTRACT

A method and an apparatus of reference notification comprises obtaining an instant message that is sent from a sending user. A contact is selected that satisfies a predetermined criterion from contacts of the sending user. For the selected contact, content is determined that is of interest to the selected contact, and content is found that is of interest and is included in the obtained instant message based on the determined content of interest. Based on the found content of interest, a reference notification message is sent to a contact corresponding to the found content of interest, for notifying the contact that the content of interest is referenced. By using the technical scheme of the present disclosure, the problems of existing technologies that a user cannot accurately and quickly determine whether an instant message references content with which he/she is concerned are solved.

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED PATENT APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of an international patentapplication PCT/US12/21107, filed Jan. 12, 2012, which claims priorityfrom Chinese Patent Application No. 201110030023.3, filed Jan. 27, 2011,entitled “Reference Notification Method and Apparatus,” whichapplications are hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present disclosure relates to the field of instant messaging andparticularly, relates to reference notification methods and apparatuses.

BACKGROUND

With the development of Internet technology, an increasing number ofpeople use the Internet for communication. Instant messaging (IM)technology, which is developed based on Internet communicationtechnology, receives increasing attention and recognition from thepublic due to characteristics such as real-time, convenience andpromptness. A user can exchange instant messages with different contactsusing an IM client.

Two users can exchange instant messages through an instant chat. Ifmultiple users want to conduct instant messaging at the same time, amessaging group needs to be formed. For example, a user A, a user B anda user C form a messaging group if the user A, the user B and the user Cwant to conduct a multi-end chat through respective IM clients. Eachinstant message sent by a user to the messaging group can be received byother users in the messaging group.

Two problems exist in existing instant messaging technology:

(1) Regardless of instant messaging between two users through an instantchat or instant messaging among multiple users through a messaginggroup, a user who does not belong to that instant chat or instant groupcannot know whether instant messages therein mention any content withwhich he/she is concerned, e.g., referencing his/her name, referencing auser name of a user with whom he/she is concerned, or referencing akeyword with which he/she is concerned (for instance, referencing aconcerned keyword “soccer”).

(2) Regardless of instant messaging between two users through an instantchat or instant messaging among multiple users through a messaginggroup, the number of instant messages exchanged between users may benumerous and cluttered. A user who receives the instant messages mayfind it difficult to accurately find content with which he/she isconcerned from these numerous and cluttered instant messages that arereceived. If the user who receives the instant messages wants to findthe content with which he/she is concerned, the user needs to search thereceived instant messages one by one. This not only wastes a lot of theuser's processing time, but also has a relatively low search efficiencyand flexibility. Furthermore, if a large number of users search chatrecords in an instant messaging server at the same time or a certainuser repeatedly searches content with which he/she is concerned in chatrecords of users who have communicated with the user, an access load ofthe instant messaging server is increased and a processing capability ofthe instant messaging server is decreased.

In short, in existing technologies, neither a user who receives aninstant message nor a user who does not receive the instant message(i.e., a user who does not belong to an instant chat or an instantgroup) can accurately and quickly determine whether the instant messagereferences content with which he/she is concerned without increasing anaccess load of an instant messaging server.

SUMMARY OF THE DISCLOSURE

The present disclosure provides a method and an apparatus of referencenotification to solve the problems of existing technologies that a usercannot accurately and quickly determine whether an instant messagereferences content with which he/she is concerned.

In one aspect of the present disclosure, a method of referencenotification may obtain an instant message that is sent from a sendinguser. The method may select one or more contacts that satisfy apredetermined criterion from contacts of the sending user. For the oneor more selected contacts, the method may determine respective contentthat is of interest to the one or more selected contacts. In someembodiments, the method may further find content of interest included inthe obtained instant message based on the determined content ofinterest. In one embodiment, based on the found content of interest, themethod may send a reference notification message to a contact thatcorresponds to the found content of interest to notify the contact thatthe found content of interest is referenced.

In another aspect of the present disclosure, a reference notificationapparatus may include an acquisition unit configured to obtain aninstant message that is sent from a sending user. Additionally, theapparatus may further include a selection unit that is configured toselect a contact that satisfies a predetermined criterion from contactsof the sending user. In some embodiments, the apparatus may furtherinclude a first determination unit. The first determination unit isconfigured to determine, for the contact selected by the selection unit,content that is of interest to the contact. Furthermore, the apparatusmay include a searching unit configured to find content of interestincluded in the instant message obtained by the acquisition unit basedon, for example, the content determined by the first determination unit.In one embodiment, the apparatus may further include a sending unitconfigured to send, to a contact corresponding to the found content ofinterest, a reference notification message for notifying the contactthat the content of interest is referenced based on the content ofinterest found by the searching unit.

The exemplary embodiments of the present disclosure obtain an instantmessage that is sent from a sending user, and select a contact thatsatisfies a predetermined criterion from contacts of the sending user.Furthermore, the exemplary embodiments may determine, for the selectedcontact, content that is of interest to the selected contact, and findcontent of interest included in the obtained instant message based onthe determined content. Based on the found content of interest, theexemplary embodiments may send, to a contact corresponding to the foundcontent of interest, a reference notification message for notifying thecontact that the found content of interest is referenced.

In one embodiment, if the contact corresponding to the found content ofinterest includes a user who does not receive the instant message (e.g.,a user who does not belong to an associated instant chat or instantgroup), the user may know that content with which he/she is concerned isreferenced in the instant message that is sent by the sending userthrough the reference notification message. Additionally oralternatively, if the contact corresponding to the found content ofinterest includes a user who receives the instant message (e.g., a userwho belongs to the instant chat or instant group), the user may know intime which instant message references content with which he/she isconcerned based on the received reference notification message, and thusmay search all instant messages that are received accordingly. Thissaves the user a lot of processing time, and effectively improves searchefficiency and flexibility. Furthermore, as the user will not repeatedlysearch for content with which he/she is concerned in an instantmessaging server, an access load of the instant messaging server willnot be increased.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a flowchart illustrating a method of reference notification inaccordance with a first embodiment of the present disclosure.

FIG. 2 is a structural diagram illustrating an instant messaging systemin accordance with a second embodiment of the present disclosure.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart illustrating a method of reference notification inaccordance with a third embodiment of the present disclosure.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart illustrating a method of reference notification inaccordance with a fourth embodiment of the present disclosure.

FIG. 5 is a structural diagram illustrating an apparatus of referencenotification in accordance with a fifth embodiment of the presentdisclosure.

FIG. 6 is a schematic diagram illustrating the exemplary apparatusdescribed in FIG. 5 in more detail.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Implementation principles, specific implementation methods and achievedadvantages of the technical scheme of the exemplary embodiments of thepresent disclosure are described in detail herein in conjunction withthe accompanying figures.

First Embodiment

FIG. 1 shows a flowchart illustrating a method of reference notificationin accordance with the first embodiment of the present disclosure, whichincludes the following process.

Block 11 obtains an instant message sent from a sending user.

In the first embodiment of the present disclosure, a sending user maysend an instant message for an instant chat. This instant message isreferred to as an instant chat message. A user who establishes theinstant chat with the sending user and receives the instant chat messageis referred to as a target receiving user of the instant chat message.Alternatively, the sending user may send an instant message for amessaging group. This instant message is referred to as an instant groupmessage. All users other than the sending user who are included in themessaging group and receive the instant group message are referred to astarget receiving users of the instant group message.

An instant message includes a receiver identifier. If the receiveridentifier is a user identifier of a certain user, this instant messageis determined to be specified for a user corresponding to the useridentifier, i.e., the instant message is an instant chat message. If theidentifier of the receiver is a group identifier of a messaging group,this instant message is determined to be specified for a messaging groupcorresponding to the messaging group identifier, i.e., the instantmessage is an instant group message.

Block 12 selects a contact that satisfies a predetermined criterion fromcontacts of the sending user.

In the first embodiment of the present disclosure, contacts of thesending user include not only buddies whom the sending user has addedwhen conducting instant messaging (i.e., contacts of a buddy list) butalso users of a messaging group in which the sending user has joined.

A method of selecting a contact that satisfies a predetermined criterionmay include, but is not limited to, selecting all contacts of thesending user. Additionally or alternatively, the contact selectionmethod may include selecting buddies of the sending user, i.e., contactswithin a buddy list. In some embodiments, the contact selection methodmay additionally or alternatively include determining target receivingusers who receive the instant message, and rendering the determinedtarget receiving users as contacts that satisfy the predeterminedcriterion.

As described above, the first embodiment selects contacts that satisfy apredetermined criterion, who may be target receiving users receiving theinstant message (e.g., users who belong to associated instant chat orinstant group) or users who do not receive the instant message (e.g.,user who do not belong to the instant chat or instant group).

Block 13 determines, for the selected contact, content that is ofinterest to the selected contact.

The sending user stores content that is of interest to each contact inadvance. The content of interest may include, but is not limited to, atleast one of the following content: a user identifier of the contact, auser identifier of a concerned user who is of interest to the contact,and a keyword that is of interest to the contact.

For example, if a user A is interested in an instant message thatmentions him/her, content that is of interest to the user A includes auser identifier thereof. If the user A is further interested in aninstant message that mentions user B, the user B is a user who is ofinterest to the user A. The content that is of interest to the user Aincludes a user identifier of the user B. If a user C is interested inan instant message that mentions about “soccer”, “soccer” is a keywordof interest to the user C. The content of interest to the user Cincludes this keyword “soccer”. If the user A and the user C both arecontacts of a user D, the user D may store the content that is ofinterest to the user A and the user C using the following butnon-limiting tabular format:

Contact Content of interest User A User A User B User C soccer

In an alternative embodiment, the sending user may not store the contentof interest to each contact in advance. Instead, the sending userobtains relevant information from an instant messaging server whenneeding to determine content of interest to a certain contact. In otherwords, the instant messaging server stores content of interest to eachcontact therein beforehand.

Block 14 finds content of interest included in the obtained instantmessage based on the determined content of interest.

The first embodiment of the present disclosure may include, but is notlimited to, the following method to find the content of interest:matching information content of the obtained instant message with eachdetermined content of interest; and rendering successfully matchedcontent of interest as content of interest included in the obtainedinstant message.

Block 15 sends to the contact, for the found content of interest, acontact corresponding to the content of interest, a referencenotification message notifying the contact that the content of interestis referenced.

For each found content of interest, a reference notification message tobe sent to corresponding contact is first generated. The referencenotification message may include information content of the instantmessage, attribute information of the instant message, or both.

The information content of the instant message may be an entire text oran abstract of the instant message. If the information content is anabstract, the abstract is extracted from the entire text of the instantmessage according to a predetermined extraction rule.

The attribute information of the instant message may include, but is notlimited to, at least one of the following information: the content ofinterest, a user identifier of the sending user, an informationidentifier of the instant message, a sending time of the instantmessage, and a messaging identifier corresponding to the instantmessage.

If the instant message is an instant chat message for an instant chat,the messaging identifier corresponding to the instant message is a chatidentifier of the instant chat. If the instant message is an instantgroup message for a messaging group, the messaging identifiercorresponding to the instant message is a group identifier of themessaging group.

If the contact corresponding to the found content of interest includes atarget receiving user who receives the instant message, the user mayknow which instant message received mentions his/her content of interestbased on the received reference notification message, and may search allreceived instant messages accordingly, thus saving the user a lot ofprocessing time and effectively improving search efficiency andflexibility.

If the contact corresponding to the found content of interest includes atarget receiving user who does not directly receive the instant message,and the user cannot search the instant message through chat records, theentire text of the instant message may be attached to the referencenotification message and sent to this user.

In order to improve the privacy of the instant message, the firstembodiment of the present embodiment proposes that, if the contactcorresponding to the found content of interest is not a target receivinguser who directly receives the instant message, the sending user maydetermine whether to send the reference notification message to thecontact based on a predetermined character. Specifically:

If the sending user wants to send a reference notification message to acontact who is not a target receiving user of an instant message and theinstant message includes content of interest to the contact, the sendinguser may insert a predetermined character before or after the content ofinterest. Later, prior to sending the reference notification message tothe contact corresponding to the content of interest, a determination isfirst made as to whether the contact corresponding to the content ofinterest is a target receiving user of the instant message. If adetermination result is negative, a determination is made as to whetherthe instant message includes a predetermined character that is adjacentto the content of interest. If included, a reference notificationmessage is sent to the contact. If not included, the referencenotification message will not be sent to the contact. Adjacency betweenthe predetermined character and the content of interest may include apositioning of the predetermined character before or after the contentof interest.

If the contact corresponding to the found content of interest iscurrently online, the reference notification message may be sent to thecontact directly. If the contact is currently offline, the referencenotification message may be stored in an instant messaging server first.The instant messaging server detects a status of the contact in realtime. Upon detecting that the contact changes from offline to online,the stored reference notification message is sent to the contact. As canbe seen, even if the contact is offline, the reference notificationmessage may still be sent to the contact when the contact becomesonline, thus improving flexibility of reference notification.

When sending a reference notification message to a contact whose statuschanges from offline to online, the instant messaging server may need tosend multiple reference notification messages to the contact. Theinstant messaging server may send each reference notification messageseparately or in combination. A method of sending in combinationincludes: first determining each reference notification message thatneeds to be sent to the contact from among all stored referencenotification messages, and combining the determined referencenotification messages and sending it to the contact. The combinedreference notification message may further include the number of thereference notification messages that need to be sent to the contact. Ascan be seen, the instant messaging server may send multiple referencenotification messages at one time, thus saving processing resources ofthe instant messaging server.

In a messaging group, in order to know accurately which user has beenreferenced most, the first embodiment proposes recording the number oftimes that each user in a messaging group is referenced. When a sendinguser sends an instant message for a messaging group, if the instantmessage includes information of a user identifier of a certain targetreceiving user of the messaging group, the number of times that thetarget receiving user is referenced is increased by one, and each userof the messaging group is notified thereof. An instant messaging clientof each user has a display area on a display interface thereof. Thedisplay area displays the number of times that each user of themessaging group is referenced. Based on the above notification, theinstant messaging client of each user updates the number of times thatthe target receiving user is referenced in the display area. The displayarea may further display a reference number of a user which isreferenced by all users in the messaging group. As such, users canvisually obtain the number of times that each user is referenced, andfrom which, determine a respective degree of interest of each user.

In this first embodiment, the instant message may be sent to the targetreceiving users prior to sending the reference notification message tothe contacts. Or, the reference notification message may be sent to thecontacts prior to sending the instant message to the target receivingusers. The reference notification message may be sent to the contacts atthe time when the instant message is sent to the target receiving users.

As can be seen from the above process, the technical scheme of theexemplary embodiments of the present disclosure first obtains an instantmessage that is sent from a sending user, selects a contact thatsatisfies a predetermined criterion from contacts of the sending user,determines, for the selected contact, content that is of interest to theselected contact, finds content of interest included in the obtainedinstant message based on the determined content, and based on the foundcontent of interest, sends to, a contact corresponding to the foundcontent of interest, a reference notification message for notifying thecontact that the content of interest is referenced. If the contactcorresponding to the found content of interest includes a user who doesnot receive the instant message (e.g., a user who does not belong toassociated instant chat or instant group), the user may know thatcontent with which he/she is concerned is referenced in the instantmessage that is sent by the sending user through the referencenotification message. If the contact corresponding to the found contentof interest includes a user who receives the instant message (e.g., auser who belongs to the instant chat or instant group), the user mayknow which instant message references content with which he/she isconcerned in time based on the received reference notification message,and thus may search all instant messages that are received accordingly.This saves a lot of processing time of the user, and effectivelyimproves search efficiency and flexibility. Furthermore, as the userwill not repeatedly search for content with which he/she is concerned inan instant messaging server, an access load of the instant messagingserver will not be increased.

Second Embodiment

FIG. 2 shows a structural diagram of an instant messaging system inaccordance with the second embodiment of the present disclosure, whichincludes an instant messaging client 21 of each instant messaging userand an instant messaging server 22 at a network side.

Instant messaging users may exchange instant messages through respectiveinstant messaging clients 21. More specifically, an instant messagingclient of a sending user of an instant message receives the instantmessage inputted by the sending user, and sends the instant message totarget receiving users based on the a receiver identifier of the instantmessage.

The instant messaging users may exchange instant messages through theinstant messaging server 22. Specifically, an instant messaging clientof a sending user of an instant message receives the instant messageinputted by the sending user and sends the instant message to theinstant messaging server 22. The instant messaging server 22 sends theinstant message to target receiving users based on a receiver identifierof the instant message.

In this second embodiment, a reference notification message may be sentby the instant messaging client 21 of a sending user. In other words, anexecution entity of blocks 11-15 is the instant messaging client of thesending user. Alternatively, the reference notification message may besent by the instant messaging server 22. In other words, an executionentity of blocks 11-15 is the instant messaging server 22. These twoscenarios are separately described in detail below.

Third Embodiment

FIG. 3 shows a flowchart illustrating a method of reference notificationfor a situation in which the execution entity is an instant messagingclient of a sending user, and contacts that satisfy a predeterminedcriterion correspond to contacts in a buddy list of the sending user whosends an instant message.

At block 31, an instant messaging client of a sending user obtains aninstant message inputted by the sending user at the instant messagingclient.

At block 32, the instant message is sent to an instant messaging clientof each target receiving user.

At block 33, for each contact of a buddy list of the sending user, arespective content of interest of each contact is determined.

At block 34, information content of the instant message is separatelymatched with each determined content of interest.

At block 35, successfully matched content of interest is rendered ascontent of interest included in the instant message.

At block 36, a respective instant reference notification message isseparately generated for each rendered content of interest. Thereference notification message is used for notifying a contact thatcorresponding content of interest is referenced. The referencenotification message includes a user identifier of the sending user, aninformation identifier of the instant message, a sending time of theinstant message, an entire text of the instant message, and a messagingidentifier corresponding to the instant message.

At block 37, a determination is made as to whether a contactcorresponding to the content of interest is currently online. If adetermination result is affirmative, the process proceeds to block 38.If the determination result is negative, the process proceeds to block39.

At block 38, the generated reference notification message is sent to thecontact corresponding to the content of interest.

At block 39, the reference notification message is stored in an instantmessaging server.

At block 310, in response to detecting that a status of the contactchanges from offline to online, the instant messaging server sends thestored reference notification message to an instant messaging client ofthe contact.

The instant messaging client may send the instant message or thereference notification message to other users directly or through theinstant messaging server.

Since an instant messaging client completes both the determination ofcontent of interest included in an instant message and the generation ofa reference notification message, processing resources of an instantmessaging server can be saved effectively.

Fourth Embodiment

FIG. 3 shows a flowchart illustrating a method of reference notificationfor a situation in which the execution entity is an instant messagingclient of a sending user, and contacts that satisfy a predeterminedcriterion correspond to target receiving users who receives an instantmessage.

At block 41, an instant messaging client of a sending user obtains aninstant message inputted by the sending user at the instant messagingclient.

At block 42, the instant messaging client sends the instant message toan instant messaging server.

At block 43, the instant messaging server sends the instant message toeach target receiving user.

At block 44, for each target receiving user, the instant messagingserver separately determines respective content of interest of eachtarget receiving user.

At block 45, the instant messaging server matches information content ofthe instant message with each determined content of interest.

At block 46, the instant messaging server renders successfully matchedcontent of interest as content of interest included in the instantmessage.

At block 47, the instant messaging server separately generates aninstant reference notification message for each rendered content ofinterest. The reference notification message is used for notifying acontact that corresponding content of interest is referenced. Thereference notification message includes a user identifier of the sendinguser, an information identifier of the instant message, a sending timeof the instant message, an abstract of the instant message, and amessaging identifier corresponding to the instant message.

At block 48, the instant messaging server determines whether a targetreceiving user corresponding to the content of interest is currentlyonline. If a determination result is affirmative, the process proceedsto block 49. If the determination result is negative, the processproceeds to block 410.

At block 49, the instant messaging server sends the generated referencenotification message to the target receiving user corresponding to thecontent of interest.

At block 410, the instant messaging server stores the referencenotification message.

At block 411, the instant messaging server sends the stored referencenotification message to the target receiving user in response todetecting that a status of the target receiving user changes fromoffline to online.

Fifth Embodiment

Correspondingly, FIG. 5 shows a reference notification apparatus inaccordance with the fifth embodiment of the present disclosure. Theapparatus may include an acquisition unit 51, a selection unit 52, afirst determination unit 53, a searching unit 54 and a sending unit 55.

In one embodiment, the acquisition unit 51 is used for obtaining aninstant message that is sent from a sending user. The selection unit 52is used for selecting a contact that satisfies a predetermined criterionfrom contacts of the sending user. The first determination unit 53 isused for determining, for the contact selected by the selection unit 52,content that is of interest to the contact. The searching unit 54 isused for finding content of interest included in the instant messageobtained by the acquisition unit 51 based on the content determined bythe first determination unit 53. The sending unit 55 is used for sendingto, a contact corresponding to the found content of interest, areference notification message for notifying that the content ofinterest is referenced based on the content of interest found by thesearching unit 54.

In some embodiments, the selection unit 52 may include a firstdetermination sub-unit and a second determination sub-unit. The firstdetermination sub-unit is used for determining each target receivinguser who receives the instant message. The second determination sub-unitis used for rendering each target receiving user determined by the firstdetermination sub-unit as a contact that satisfies the predeterminedcriterion.

In one embodiment, the searching unit 54 may include a matching sub-unitand a third determination sub-unit. The matching sub-unit is used forseparately matching information content of the instant message that isobtained by the acquisition unit 51 with the determined content ofinterest determined by the first determination unit 53. The thirddetermination sub-unit is used for rendering content of interestsuccessfully matched by the matching sub-unit as content of interestincluded in the instant message obtained by the acquisition unit 51.

In one embodiment, the reference notification apparatus may furtherinclude a judging unit and a second determination unit. The judging unitis used for determining, for each content of interest found by thesearching unit 54, whether a contact corresponding to the respectivecontent of interest is a target receiving user of the instant message.The second determination unit is used for determining, for each contentof interest found by the searching unit 54, if a determination result ofthe judging unit is negative, determining that the instant messageincludes a predetermined character that is adjacent to the respectivecontent of interest.

In some embodiments, the sending unit 55 may include a first judgingsub-unit, a first sending sub-unit and a first storage sub-unit. Thefirst judging sub-unit is used for determining, for the content ofinterest found by the searching unit 54, whether a contact correspondingto the content of interest is currently online. The first sendingsub-unit is used for sending the reference notification message to thecontact if a determination result of the first judging sub-unit isaffirmative. The first storage sub-unit is used for storing thereference notification message in an instant messaging server if thedetermination result of the first judging sub-unit is negative.

Furthermore, in one embodiment, the sending unit 55 may include a secondjudging sub-unit, a second sending sub-unit, a second storage sub-unit,a detection sub-unit and a third sending sub-unit. The second judgingsub-unit is used for determining, for the content of interest found bythe searching unit 54, whether a contact corresponding to the content ofinterest is currently online. The second sending sub-unit is used forsending the reference notification message to the contact if adetermination result of the second judging sub-unit is affirmative. Thesecond storage sub-unit is used for storing the reference notificationmessage in an instant messaging server if the determination result ofthe second judging sub-unit is negative. The detection sub-unit is usedfor detecting a status of the contact if the determination result of thesecond judging sub-unit is negative. The third sending sub-unit is usedfor sending the reference notification message that is stored by thestorage sub-unit to the contact when the detection sub-unit detects thatthe status of the contact changes from offline to online.

In some embodiments, the third sending sub-unit may include adetermination module, incorporating combination module and a sendingmodule. The determination module is used for determining each referencenotification message to be sent to the contact when the detectionsub-unit detects that the status of the contact changes from online tooffline. The combination module is used for combining determined eachreference notification message that is determined by the determinationmodule together. The sending module is used for sending a combinedreference notification message that has been processed by thecombination module to the contact.

One skilled in the art should understand that the exemplary embodimentsof the present disclosure can be provided as methods, apparatuses(devices), or computer program products. Therefore, the presentdisclosure may be implemented in terms of hardware only, software only,or a combination of hardware and software. Furthermore, the presentdisclosure may be implemented in a form of a computer program producthaving one or more computer storage media including computer-executableinstructions (including, but not limited to, disk storage, CD-ROM,optical disks, etc.).

The present disclosure is described with reference to flowcharts and/orblock diagrams of the exemplary method, apparatus (device) and computerprogram product. It should be understood that each flow and/or block anda combination of flows and/or blocks of the flowcharts and/or blockdiagrams may be implemented by computer program instructions. Thesecomputer program instructions may be provided to general computers,specialized computers, embedded processors or other programmable dataprocessors to generate a machine, in order to create an apparatusimplementing designated functions within one or more flows of theflowcharts and/or one or more blocks of the block diagrams throughexecuting instructions by a computer or other programmable dataprocessors.

These computer program instructions may alternatively be stored incomputer-readable storage which can instruct a computer or otherprogrammable data processors to operate in a specific way, so that theinstructions stored in the computer-readable storage generate a productincluding an instruction apparatus. The instruction apparatus implementsdesignated functions in one or more flows of the flowcharts and/or oneor more blocks of the block diagrams.

These computer program instructions may alternatively be loaded in acomputer or other programmable data processors, so that the computer orother programmable data processors can perform a series of acts togenerate a computer-implemented process. Accordingly, instructionsexecuted in the computer or other programmable data processors canprovide acts for implementing designated functions in one or more flowsof the flowcharts and/or one or more blocks of the block diagrams.

For example, FIG. 6 illustrates an exemplary apparatus 600, such as theapparatus as described above, in more detail. In one embodiment, theapparatus 600 can include, but is not limited to, one or more processors601, a network interface 602, memory 603, and an input/output interface604.

The memory 603 may include computer-readable media in the form ofvolatile memory, such as random-access memory (RAM) and/or non-volatilememory, such as read only memory (ROM) or flash RAM. The memory 603 isan example of computer-readable media.

Computer-readable media includes volatile and non-volatile, removableand non-removable media implemented in any method or technology forstorage of information such as computer readable instructions, datastructures, program modules, or other data. Examples of computer storagemedia includes, but is not limited to, phase change memory (PRAM),static random-access memory (SRAM), dynamic random-access memory (DRAM),other types of random-access memory (RAM), read-only memory (ROM),electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), flashmemory or other memory technology, compact disk read-only memory(CD-ROM), digital versatile disks (DVD) or other optical storage,magnetic cassettes, magnetic tape, magnetic disk storage or othermagnetic storage devices, or any other non-transmission medium that canbe used to store information for access by a computing device. Asdefined herein, computer-readable media does not include transitorymedia such as modulated data signals and carrier waves.

The memory 603 may include program units 605 and program data 606. Inone embodiment, the program units 605 may include an acquisition unit607, a selection unit 608, a first determination unit 609, a searchingunit 610 and a sending unit 611. In one embodiment, the program unit 605may further include a judging unit 612 and a second determination unit613. Details about these program units and any sub-units and/or modulesthereof may be found in the foregoing embodiments described above.

Although preferred embodiments of the present disclosure are described,one skilled in the art can perform additional alterations andmodifications to these embodiments once understanding the fundamentalcreative concept. Accordingly, it is intended that the claims cover allmodifications and variations which fall within the scope of the claimsof the present disclosure and preferred embodiments. One skilled in theart can alter or modify the disclosed method, system and apparatus inmany different ways without departing from the spirit and the scope ofthis disclosure. It is intended that the present disclosure covers allmodifications and variations which fall within the scope of the claimsof the present disclosure and their equivalents.

1. A reference notification method comprising: under control of one ormore processors configured with executable instructions: obtaining aninstant message sent from a sending user; selecting a contact thatsatisfies a predetermined criterion from contacts of the sending user;determining, for the selected contact, content of interest to theselected contact; finding content of interest included in the obtainedinstant message based on the determined content of interest; and for thefound content of interest, sending, to the contact corresponding to thecontent of interest, a reference notification message notifying thecontact that the content of interest is referenced.
 2. The method asrecited in claim 1, wherein selecting the contact that satisfies thepredetermined criterion from the contacts of the sending user comprises:determining each target receiving user who receives the instant message;and rendering each target receiving user as the contact that satisfiesthe predetermined criterion.
 3. The method as recited in claim 1,wherein the content of interest comprises at least one of the followingcontent: a user identifier of the contact; a user identifier of a userof interest to the contact; and a keyword of interest to the contact. 4.The method as recited in claim 1, wherein finding the content ofinterest included in the obtained instant message based on thedetermined content of interest comprises: separately matchinginformation content of the obtained instant message with each determinedcontent of interest; and rendering successfully matched content ofinterest as the content of interest included in the obtained instantmessage.
 5. The method as recited in claim 1, wherein prior to sendingthe reference notification message to the contact corresponding to thecontent of interest, the method further comprises: determining whetherthe contact corresponding to the content of interest is a receiving userof the instant message; and if a determination result is negative,determining that the instant message includes a predetermined characteradjacent to the content of interest.
 6. The method as recited in claim1, wherein sending the reference notification message to the contactcorresponding to the content of interest comprises: determining whetherthe contact corresponding to the content of interest is currentlyonline; if a determination result is affirmative, sending the referencenotification message to the contact; and if the determination result isnegative, storing the reference notification message in an instantmessaging server.
 7. The method as recited in claim 1, wherein sendingthe reference notification message to the contact corresponding to thecontent of interest comprises: determining whether the contactcorresponding to the content of interest is currently online; if adetermination result is affirmative, sending the reference notificationmessage to the contact; and if the determination result is negative,storing the reference notification message in an instant messagingserver, and sending the reference notification message to the contact inresponse to detecting that a status of the contact changes from offlineto online.
 8. The method as recited in claim 1, wherein sending thereference notification message to the contact in response to detectingthat the status of the contact changes from offline to online comprises:in response to detecting that the status of the contact changes fromoffline to online, determining each reference notification message to besent to the contact from stored reference notification messages; andupon combining each determined reference notification message, sendingthe combined reference notification message to the contact.
 9. Themethod as recited in claim 1, wherein the reference notification messagecomprises content information of the instant message and/or attributeinformation of the instant message.
 10. The method as recited in claim9, wherein the content information of the instant message comprises anentire text or an abstract of the instant message.
 11. The method asrecited in claim 9, wherein the attribute information of the instantmessage comprises at least one of the following information: the contentof interest; a user identifier of the sending user; an informationidentifier of the instant message; a sending time of the instantmessage; and a messaging identifier corresponding to the instantmessage.
 12. The method as recited in claim 11, wherein if the instantmessage is a chat instant message for an instant chat, the messagingidentifier corresponding to the instant message is a chat identifier ofthe instant chat, and if the instant message is a group instant messagefor a messaging group, the message identifier corresponding to theinstant message is a group identifier of the messaging group.
 13. Areference notification apparatus comprising: one or more processors;memory communicatively coupled to the one or more processors; anacquisition unit stored in the memory and executable by the one or moreprocessors that is configured to obtain an instant message that is sentfrom a sending user; a selection unit stored in the memory andexecutable by the one or more processors that is configured to select acontact that satisfies a predetermined criterion from contacts of thesending user; a first determination unit stored in the memory andexecutable by the one or more processors that is configured todetermine, for the contact selected by the selection unit, content thatis of interest to the contact; a searching unit stored in the memory andexecutable by the one or more processors that is configured to findcontent of interest included in the instant message obtained by theacquisition unit based on the content determined by the firstdetermination unit; and a sending unit stored in the memory andexecutable by the one or more processors that is configured to send to,a contact corresponding to the found content of interest, a referencenotification message for notifying that the content of interest isreferenced based on the content of interest found by the searching unit.14. The apparatus as recited in claim 13, wherein the selection unitcomprises: a first determination sub-unit configured to determine eachtarget receiving user who receives the instant message; and a seconddetermination sub-unit configured to render each target receiving userdetermined by the first determination sub-unit as a contact thatsatisfies the predetermined criterion.
 15. The apparatus as recited inclaim 13, wherein the searching unit comprises: a matching sub-unitconfigured to separately match information content of the instantmessage that is obtained by the acquisition unit with the determinedcontent of interest determined by the first determination unit; and athird determination sub-unit configured to render content of interestsuccessfully matched by the matching sub-unit as content of interestincluded in the instant message obtained by the acquisition unit. 16.The apparatus as recited in claim 13, further comprising: a judging unitconfigured to determine, for each content of interest found by thesearching unit, whether a contact corresponding to the respectivecontent of interest is a target receiving user of the instant message;and a second determination unit configured to determine, for eachcontent of interest found by the searching unit, if a determinationresult of the judging unit is negative, and to determine that theinstant message includes a predetermined character that is adjacent tothe respective content of interest.
 17. The apparatus as recited inclaim 13, wherein the sending unit comprises: a first judging sub-unitconfigured to determine, for the content of interest found by thesearching unit, whether a contact corresponding to the content ofinterest is currently online; a first sending sub-unit configured tosend the reference notification message to the contact if adetermination result of the first judging sub-unit is affirmative; and afirst storage sub-unit configured to store the reference notificationmessage in an instant messaging server if the determination result ofthe first judging sub-unit is negative.
 18. The apparatus as recited inclaim 13, wherein the sending unit comprises: a second judging sub-unitconfigured to determine, for the content of interest found by thesearching unit, whether a contact corresponding to the content ofinterest is currently online; a second sending sub-unit configured tosend the reference notification message to the contact if adetermination result of the second judging sub-unit is affirmative; asecond storage sub-unit configured to store the reference notificationmessage in an instant messaging server if the determination result ofthe second judging sub-unit is negative; a detection sub-unit configuredto detect a status of the contact if the determination result of thesecond judging sub-unit is negative; and a third sending sub-unitconfigured to send the reference notification message that is stored bythe storage sub-unit to the contact when the detection sub-unit detectsthat the status of the contact changes from offline to online.
 19. Theapparatus as recited in claim 18, wherein the third sending sub-unitcomprises: a determination module configured to determine each referencenotification message to be sent to the contact when the detectionsub-unit detects that the status of the contact changes from online tooffline; a combination module configured to combine together eachdetermined reference notification message that is determined by thedetermination module; and a sending module is configured to send acombined reference notification message that has been processed by thecombination module to the contact.
 20. One or more computer-readablemedia configured with computer-executable instructions that, whenexecuted by one or more processors, configure the one or more processorsto perform acts comprising: obtaining an instant message sent from asending user; selecting one or more contacts that satisfy apredetermined criterion from contacts of the sending user; for each ofthe one or more selected contacts, determining content of interest tothe respective one of the one or more selected contacts; finding contentof interest included in the obtained instant message based on thedetermined content of interest to each of the one or more selectedcontacts; and sending a reference notification message to a contactcorresponding to the found content of interest, the referencenotification message notifying the corresponding contact that the foundcontent of interest is referenced.